On September 14 2003, the USAF's aerial demonstration team, the Thunderbirds, lost a General Dynamics F-16C Fighting Falcon during a demonstration at Mountain Home AFB in Idaho.

Captain Chris Stricklin was attempting to perform a split-S when he basically ran out of altitude. He ejected and survived without serious injury. The F-16C was destroyed, and its loss was attributed to pilot error. Subsquently, Captain Stricklin has been reassigned to Washington, D.C., working the halls of the Pentagon.

The good men of Boots and Sabers have posted in-cockpit video; find it in their initial here. Additional information can be found here in the F-16.net story on the final report.

Posted by: Country Pundit at 02:55 PM | No Comments | Add Comment
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I found this on CNN today; it finally "proves" the old saw I'd heard about Dr. Henry A. Kissinger making some thinly-veiled remark to someone (probably an OPEC minister) that the West would not for long tolerate the oil embargos of the 1970s. The British intelligence apparat seems to have been concerned that President Nixon would order some sort of invasion of the Middle East, to secure the oil reserves there and to get them out of the hands of the OPEC magnates.

According to these documents---which I intend to try and track down---the Brits determined that we were right angry over the embargo (y'think?) and that we could do pretty good by bagging Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, and Abu Dhabi.

Leave it to President Nixon to take a bold stance in dealing with Arab perfidy. I wasn't alive during the oil embargo of 1973, so I don't remember anything about it. This sort of reputation is one reason I like Richard Nixon. Although the existence of the 'madman theory' has been reportedly discredited, it is good when those who want to oppose you have to fear you. It doesn't do much to embolden OPEC if they have to worry about American paras falling in on them after a production cut and a price hike.

Anyways.

Admittedly, now that I think about it, we're already in Saudi Arabia, and Kuwait, and I bet the Brits would swap Abu Dhabi for Iraq pretty easily. Heh heh heh, the Nixon Administration proves its presience again! That article a couple of months ago comparing Nixon to Bush seems to have been born out after all.

I can now feel better about having Bush as the President for the next four years. It's fun using slogans like, "Re-elect the President" or "Now, more than ever." That just warms my evil little Republican operative's heart.

Posted by: Country Pundit at 11:53 PM | No Comments | Add Comment
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